GURPS together with HERO.

[fredrik_nilsson]

Compared to GURPS the fifth edition of the HERO System is quite new on the arena. The HERO system has done a really good job in trying to catch up, but doing all the books I want for my campaigns takes time, and I hate to wait, so I some questions for you.

 

How easy is it to use GURPS material in the HERO System? The inspirational material should work just as good, so there isn’t much need talking about that, but the rest?

 

Do I need the GURPS Basic Set to convert the world books to HERO, or is it just as easy to use the books without the Basic Set?

 

Can you recommend some interesting GURPS book that cover stuff that isn’t covered by existing HERO books?

 

Before anyone asks what I intend to use the HERO to run, my next campaign will probably be a fantasy-techno campaign set in the near future. Think Solar Hero, with fantasy and horror elements.

 

These GURPS books, seems interesting:

 

GURPS Bio-Tech

GURPS CthulhuPunk

GURPS Illuminati

GURPS IOU (Illuminati University)

 

I thought about GURPS Black Ops, but I guess if you’ve ever seen MIB or X-files you have enough ideas in that area to save the money for that book. I might be wrong.

[Fitz]

Gurps Lite (free download) will suffice for most translations, since all that's really needed in most cases is an idea of relative power. I've generally found trying to do a point-to-point translation more trouble than its worth -- far easier to take the concept and rebuild it in Hero terms.

[Lord Liaden]

Michael Surbrook posted fairly detailed notes for converting writeups for GURPS Supers to HERO System on his great "Surbrook's Stuff" website. While the Super Advantages don't directly apply outside of supers games (although they can help you figure what HERO Power to use for a given effect in GURPS), things like Characteristics and Skills used throughout GURPS remain pretty constant:

 

http://www.devermore.net/surbrook/herosource/gurpshero.html

[lemming]

I'll second Fitz. You don't need the full on rules book to convert. I do the same in that I tend to run with the concept rather than go for exact conversions.

 

These books may also be of your liking:

Black Ops (It's a great book)

Technomancer

Warehouse 23

 

My GURPs area is very large and the last actual GURPs game I ran was ~'86.

[Mark Taylor]

Nowadays, if you want exact descriptions of what all the different advantages, disadvantages and skills in various GURPS sourcebooks do, you would need Basic Set and Compendium I. But I agree with the previous posts, being faithful to the concept is what's most important, and you can probably achieve that with just a little good judgement and GURPS Lite.

 

Download it here, and / or find some "Men in Black" next time you're at a con and pick up a paper copy.

 

All the GURPS books you mentioned are great. CthulhuPunk in fact is what I'm GMing right now and it's been a kick-ass campaign so far (also having some Call of Cthulhu books helps with CthulhuPunk). IOU is very silly but also great if you like silly stuff. Illuminati is a brilliant source for any kind of conspiracy gaming, and Bio-Tech is a fairly thourough treatment of the eponymous subject, from present day to far future.

[fredrik_nilsson]

Thanks everybody for the help. Just emulating the concept, and not the rules sounds perfect with me.

 

Originally posted by Realms of Chaos

Nowadays, if you want exact descriptions of what all the different advantages, disadvantages and skills in various GURPS sourcebooks do, you would need Basic Set and Compendium I. But I agree with the previous posts, being faithful to the concept is what's most important, and you can probably achieve that with just a little good judgement and GURPS Lite.

 

I have a few questions regarding GURPS. Is the Lite version good enough to run games with? I've just browsed thru, so I haven't really got an idea how it works in play.

 

Which GURPS books are the minimum required to run a GURPS game. I have got the idea that be just as flexible in GURPS as you are in HERO, you the GURPS Basic Set and both the Compendiums. Is that true. Can I run a game with just GURPS BASIC, without having to come up with everything myself?

 

I've also got the impression that some world books are more or less required, like Psionics. At least if you want to run occult games. Is that also true?

 

How much use is just the Basic Set can it handle most situations?

 

Download it url="http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/lite/"]here[/url], and / or find some "Men in Black" next time you're at a con and pick up a paper copy.

 

I'll take a look at it. Thanks for the tips.

 

All the GURPS books you mentioned are great. CthulhuPunk in fact is what I'm GMing right now and it's been a kick-ass campaign so far (also having some Call of Cthulhu books helps with CthulhuPunk).

 

The cyberpunk and horror mix appeals to me.

 

IOU is very silly but also great if you like silly stuff.

 

I've already understood that it's not the most serious game book created, but can you run campaigns with it, or is it more suited for one-nighters? Comic rpg tend to loose it's attraction quite soon.

 

Illuminati is a brilliant source for any kind of conspiracy gaming, and Bio-Tech is a fairly thourough treatment of the eponymous subject, from present day to far future.

 

I've played the Illuminati card game, does that game remind about the RPG?

 

I've seen the Vampire card game, and its quite close to the rpg as far as setting is concerned.

[Toadmaster]

It is possible to play GURPS with just the basic set but unless you were playing a minimal magic fantasy game or a game set in modern times with only a little gun play I think you would really need more. The basic set includes a small selection of firearms and melee weapons, and a small section on magic (a few elemental magics, fire ball etc). If you want to have any kind of real magic in your game you will want the magic book, if you want voodoo type magic you will want the voodoo book, if you want psionics you will want that book etc.

 

Unlike HERO where you could "build" all of these things yourself and the specific books just reduce your workload GURPS does not really provide a method for creating all of these things for you game.

 

A reasonable expectaion of the books you would need for a fanatsy game as an example is GURPS Basic set, Gurps fantasy, and Gurps magic. Also highly desirable would be one or more of the beastiaries, fantasy folk and 1 or both of the compendiums. Of course Psionics, voodoo etc may also be desirable. Other genres have similar needs.

[Ron]

Originally posted by fredrik_nilsson

Thanks everybody for the help. Just emulating the concept, and not the rules sounds perfect with me.

 

I have a few questions regarding GURPS. Is the Lite version good enough to run games with? I've just browsed thru, so I haven't really got an idea how it works in play.

 

Which GURPS books are the minimum required to run a GURPS game. I have got the idea that be just as flexible in GURPS as you are in HERO, you the GURPS Basic Set and both the Compendiums. Is that true. Can I run a game with just GURPS BASIC, without having to come up with everything myself?

 

I've also got the impression that some world books are more or less required, like Psionics. At least if you want to run occult games. Is that also true?

 

How much use is just the Basic Set can it handle most situations?

 

You can do well with the lite rules only. However, GURPS, despite its name, is not a general system like HERO but a modular system. Instead of a general set of rules that might be applied to most if not all situations, GURPS has a simple core of rules in which modules of rules can be easily added. As such, GURPS Magic rules are very different from the magic rules in GURPS Voodoo or from the psionics rules in GURPS Psionics. As such, although the lite version is good enough to run adventures with normal people, you'll need the supplements to add diferent "powers". The basic set expands GURPS Lite offering a sample of the Psionics system and a few more spells, but it is still oriented to no-sobrenatural adventures.

 

If you get the Basic set and Compendium I (don't bother with Compendium II), you'll have an almost complete rules set to generate character under GURPS. Again, remmember that GURPS uses exhaustive lists of advantages/disadvantages, skills, spells, psionics, and powers. Although it is suficient to cover a lot of ground, it isn't like HERO where you can customize the rules to create the the exact effect you're looking for.

[lemming]

Originally posted by fredrik_nilsson

I've played the Illuminati card game, does that game remind about the RPG?

 

I've seen the Vampire card game, and its quite close to the rpg as far as setting is concerned.

While I've derived plots from an Illuminati Card Game session, it's a bit different. It's the behind the scenes of why the Vatican controls the Boy Scouts.

[fredrik_nilsson]

I've mixed up

 

So basically my initial view of HERO and GURPS were more or less mixed up. When I first heard about Champions (the guy that recommended it hadn't played it for ages, so he didn't know about HERO) I got the impression that it were more or less a modular game, that started out as a superhero game but could be converted to other genre with the genre books.

 

GURPS on the other hand I've only seen it different shops, and I know no GURPS players, so I just assumed that it could more or less handle anthing directly, but that the world books were of great help. I didn't think that they were that important.

 

That's quite interesting.

 

According to the interview that Hero Games did with Guardians of Order, the Tri-Stat's main influence is GURPS (one of the creators used to work at SJ Games), but the Tri-Stat seems to have more in common with the HERO System.

[fredrik_nilsson]

More GURPS...

 

I know that this really isn't the right place to talk about this, but since we are already talking about the game...

 

Is GURPS worth the money?

 

If I were to buy the stuff from scratch, which books are needed to run GURPS Illuminati?

[NuSoardGraphite]

Re: More GURPS...

 

Originally posted by fredrik_nilsson

Is GURPS worth the money?

 

 

That completely depends on what it is you are trying to accomplish. As mentioned above, to have all the information to play a particular genre in GURPS, you need all the appropriate world-books, as GURPS Basic Set gives you no guidelines on creating equipment and abilities for characters (aside from Magic and Psionics) thus, it can get quite expensive.

 

If your question is, "Is the GURPS Basic Set worth the money?" I'd have to say for what you get with it....no.

 

If I were to buy the stuff from scratch, which books are needed to run GURPS Illuminati?

 

Hmmm....modern-day conspiracy adventure?

 

Gurps basic set

Compendium 1 (helps a lot)

Gurps: High Tech

Gurps: Ultra Tech (for Illuminati Agents)

Gurps: Vehicles

Gurps: Covert Ops maybe

and of course, Gurps: Illuminate!

 

That'll set you back about $100+ bucks

[Ron]

Re: More GURPS...

 

Originally posted by fredrik_nilsson

I know that this really isn't the right place to talk about this, but since we are already talking about the game...

 

Is GURPS worth the money?

 

If I were to buy the stuff from scratch, which books are needed to run GURPS Illuminati?

 

In the early 90s I used GURPS in all my campaigns. Eventually, I found the whole system overrated and gave up using it. I even gave my GURPS collection to my friends that played at that time with me (nobody in my group play GURPS nowadays). Still, I got a lot of fun from the system.

 

In my opinion, the early 3rd edition GURPS books are the best. Since publication of Vehicles and Compendium, GURPS line has became obssessed with pointless details. Still, I would recomend the Basic Set, Psionics, Magic, Voodoo, Horror, Space, and probably a few more. Also, I insist that you can replace the Basic Set with Lite if you're willing to not use the advanced rules.

 

My problems with GURPS are the already mentioned obssession with details and a strong disagreement with the stats modifiers in skills. Also, I don't like the main magical system that takes too much bookkepping (spells are treated as skills that need prerequisites, which means that a compentent wizard need to known dozens of skills to do a more advanced spell) and the fact that magic (several systems), psionics, superpowers, gadgets, etc all use different rules found in different books. Finally, I hate the vehicle/equipment system, which is a simulationist design that emulates real world engineering, and the use of the imperial system (not a problem if you're raised in the US).

 

All that said, I insist that GURPS is a fine system that might be attractive to a lot of people. I still think that HERO do better as a generic system and that it is not difficult to use GURPS supplements if you already have some experience with the system, which can be obtained with GURPS Lite, available as a free download at SJGames. Many of the GURPS supplements are of high quality and cover subjects not covered in any RPG line. Go ahead and download GURPS Lite and give it a try.

[Toadmaster]

Re: More GURPS...

 

Originally posted by fredrik_nilsson

I know that this really isn't the right place to talk about this, but since we are already talking about the game...

 

Is GURPS worth the money?

 

If I were to buy the stuff from scratch, which books are needed to run GURPS Illuminati?

 

That depends on what you want to do with it. Some HERO players hate GURPS, some GURPS players hate HERO, some play both. GURPS was influenced by HERO and they say so up front, but GURPS was also based on an older game Steve Jackson did The Fantasy Trip which may or may not have influenced HERO so the two systems have something in common.

 

GURPS is desperately in need of a revision, the third edition (the current version) came out in 1989. Variuos changes over the years have made it rather difficult at times to find information since it is spread through many books. This has made GURPS more complicated than it really is. OTOH since the current version has been out so long you can probably find a used copy on ebay fairly cheap.

 

HERO is the more flexible of the two and handles multi genre games much better, it also works better for higher powered or more fantastic genres (Superheroes) better.

 

GURPS has more detail if you plan on a "realistic" genre (low magic fantasy, post apacalypse etc) many prefer GURPS. For a realistic game I'd give GURPS the vote as the better game but I have no issues with using HERO for these kinds of games and have done so many times, but I would never use GURPS for the really high end or really weird stuff though. GURPS Toons would never work but would not be that hard to do with HERO.

 

Personally I like both systems, and will play either depending on mood although since HERO 5th came out I am more into the HERO system.

 

The various GURPS books are excellent though and the GURPS basic set is useful too since the advantage disadvantage system is less open ended (GURPS you buy fear of the dark, in HERO you buy Psycological limitation - and then determine how much of a problem a fear of the dark is) so it can be helpful for ideas.